bait and Switch

bait and Switch

part two: bait and Switch Tuesday, 26 October 1999, 2:41 AM Cherry Hill Baltimore, Maryland Lucinde was in Baltimore. He didn't know how long she'd been in the city. He still wouldn't have known she was there at all if he hadn't decided something was fishy about the car that Pieterzoon was having fixed up on the sly.

Even knowing, Theo still wasn't happy. Far from it. But he felt a little better now that he was tearing through the night on his motorcycle. The roar of the engine was very like the Brujah's style, much more than the quiet machinations of the Ventrue, the deceivers.

Deceive your enemies — that Theo understood. Work with your friends. Work for a common goal. That's how it should be.

Fuck them, Theo thought. He knew it didn't work that way. But it should. The problem was, there were no friends, only allies. Allies of convenience; allies while you were within earshot, if that.

It wasn't even that Jan and Lucinde had done anything really horrible. Hell, Theo knew that. He would even count the two of them among the "decent" Kindred, which wasn't saying too much. They were barely in Pascek's league as far as conniving, fuck-you, bendover-and-take-it-up-the-ass politics went. Still, they pissed Theo off.

Lucinde, of course, could go wherever the hell she wanted to go. Theo could have quibbled protocol, the fact that she didn't bother to let him know she was around — how was he supposed to defend the damned city when he didn't know the true extent of his resources? — but he would be on shaky ground. Besides — protocol. When the hell had Theo ever argued points of protocol?

It wasn't some silly Toreador thing either, like he had his feelings hurt, or thought that he'd been snubbed. Those were sensibilities that Theo hadn't known during life — a slave doesn't have feelings, not like that; he's too busy surviving — and he hadn't developed them during unlife. The truth of the matter was that, by pulling this stunt, Lucinde was undercutting what confidence Theo had in Jan, confidence that they could work together, that they could carry out the plan — or that Jan could or would carry out his part of it. If Jan had kept this from Theo, what other important details were hidden? Lucinde was making Theo's job harder, and that was making it less likely that the Camarilla would hold out on the East Coast, and that, promoting the interests of the Camarilla, was supposed to be her number-one fucking job.

But maybe her sneaking around had more to do with Hesha. Theo didn't buy for a second that shit about a gesture of goodwill. The Setite might actually have had information about Katrina, but no way in hell was that the only thing he was there to talk about with Lucinde. The more Theo thought about it, the less it made sense for Hesha to have orchestrated Garlotte's destruction. The former prince and Ruhadze had more or less coexisted for many years — unless some major disagreement had come up in the recent past that Theo didn't know about. Possible. Besides that, though, it was not the most auspicious time to take over a city, with the Sabbat closing in — unless the Setite had a deal with the Sabbat. Again, possible.

Shit, Theo thought. Too many possibilities, and none of them as urgent as what he was doing at the moment. Unlike the ritzy part of town where Lucinde was hanging out, the Cherry Hill neighborhood was not asleep and quiet. Here, at night, the dregs rose to the surface. Pimps and prostitutes. Open-air drug markets. Young men, mostly black, who'd be lucky to live beyond twenty or twenty-five. Overdose. Violence. AIDS. They either thought Theo didn't like it at all. Not one bit. they were indestructible, immortal, or else they just didn't care. Fatalism led to fatalities.

Theo didn't seem out of place. Nobody bothered him. Maybe it was the touch of death that rode with him. Somewhere in their gut, those people on the street recognized him, knew him for what he was, kept their distance.

The address that Jan had given Theo, the address where Katrina was supposedly hiding out, was not far from the house that had been her haven before she blew her sire to bits.

Not very smart, staying so close to home, and apparently some flunky of Ruhadze's had spotted her and followed her. Then again, this particular childe of Garlotte's was not exactly noted for her subtlety and misdirection. Blowing up the prince and his entire ship in the middle of his city was a lot of things, but subtle was not one of them.

Theo parked down the block and made his way along the cracked sidewalk. The house was a bro-ken-down shack, flimsy, maybe forty years old, without much hope of making it to be much older. The front door had even less hope. Theo kicked it in, sending splintered wood from door and door frame cascading into the living room.

Before the black girl Katrina was sitting beside could open her mouth to scream, Katrina was off the couch and away in a blur. Theo was ready for that. The mortal was opening her mouth but still had not screamed when Theo cut Katrina off at the kitchen door. He gave her an elbow to the jaw, and she sprawled into the kitchen table. The lone chair clattered across the room.

Theo looked back at the black girl, maybe eighteen years old. He pointed toward the front door — what had been the front door. "Get the fuck out. Now."

The girl's scream died away instantly, but her mouth stayed open. She almost fell over herself scrambling out the door. Theo turned back to Katrina. She was about to jump up and bolt again.

"Don't," Theo said, "or it'll be the last fuckin' thing you do."

Katrina froze. Then, slowly, she picked herself up from the floor. She rubbed her jaw. It didn't seem to be broken, although Theo's blow could have broken a mortal's neck.

"I feel real sorry for you," Theo said. "I thought I told you to get outta town."

Katrina crossed her arms, set her hip defiantly. "Where am I supposed to go?"

They stood staring each other down for several seconds. "So you here to finish me?" Katrina asked finally.

"If I wanted you dead, you'd be dead by now." "That's what I figured. What do you want then, or are you just slummin' tonight?"

Katrina glared but righted the chair and sat. She brushed off her jeans and the tight, sleeveless T-shirt she was wearing. "Havin' second thoughts about lettin' me go?"

"More every minute." Theo eased back against the chipped, dirty counter. "Listen good.

Two things. First, I've got a question for you."

Finally, the scream.

"Your friend gonna bring help?" Theo asked.

"Like who? Who the fuck's gonna help me?"

"I look like a travel agent?"

"Sit down and shut the fuck up."

"Then you're gonna finish me."

"I might if you don't shut the fuck up. Where'd you get the explosives? I don't figure you for the type to have a chemistry set in the basement."

"So let me get this straight. This guy you don't know, don't know his name, comes up to you for no reason at all and offers to sell you a case of dynamite."

"Plastic explosives. Showed me how to use 'em too. And he gave 'em to me, didn't sell 'em."

"Who'd he work for?" Theo held up his hands. "No, let me guess. He didn't say. You didn't ask."

"You're gonna be pretty damn flat for a Ventrue, you don't watch it." The threat was not made in jest, and Katrina, still defiant but not quite as confrontational, sank back into her chair. "How did you meet him?"

"He found me. Said he had something I might want. Just went on from there."

"Yeah, and that better change if you wanna keep on wakin' up." Theo ignored Katrina's sneer. "He give you the stuff right then, or come back?"

"He told me to get in touch with him if I was interested. I was supposed to go to this bar up at Park Heights called Dewey's Sweatshop."

"Tell me about it. I ain't picky, but this was a real lowball joint. But I went, like he said. I asked the bartender if Johnny was around — "

"I don't know. I think it was more like a password, you know? Anyhow, I ask if Johnny's around. Bartender says no, but I give him a piece of paper with a time written on it. Then I meet the guy the next night at that time."

"Fat guy with a beard. Not one of us. Too sweaty. Must be Dewey."

"And you didn't even try to find out who this Johnny guy was workin' for?"

"So you'd know who was settin' you up to kill Garlotte and then let you take the fall."

"Look, man..." Katrina stood up and knocked the chair back against the counter. She started pacing, agitated, not nervous, back and forth in the tiny space of the kitchen, like a rat in a cage. "Maybe it's different for you, being such a big badass and all, but anything I do, somebody's gonna be yankin' my chain. I got what I wanted out of this, and that's all "Some guy. He offered. I took him up on it."

"This guy have a name?"

Katrina shrugged. "Probably. He didn't say. I didn't ask."

"Kindred?"

"Yeah, I think."

"You're pretty damn smart for a Brujah."

"It happen around here, this neighborhood?"

"Yeah. I'm not hard to find."

"Sounds classy."

"That the guy's name?" Theo interrupted. "Johnny?"

"What about the bartender?"

"Why the fuck should I care?" Katrina asked. that mattered. Garlotte's history. He's not yankin' my chain anymore. If somebody else got what they wanted too, fine. If I get fucked before it's all over, well that's just too fuckin' bad for me. You can send me a sympathy card, you Brujah archon asshole. But I tell you one thing, it won't be Garlotte tellin' me what to do. Not anymore."

Theo just watched her, watched her get herself all worked up, watched herself blow off steam, this little white girl who wasn't going to play by anybody's rules. Her type was a dime a dozen. Maybe cheaper than that. She just happened to have had access to a prince, to a careless prince, and she'd made the most of her opportunities. But there was something else. Otherwise, Theo would have crushed her that night on the dock. She sounded more like a Brujah than a Ventrue; there was enough anger. But that was true of any number of Anarchs or, of the occasional Ventrue who jumped to the Sabbat, antitribu.

As Theo watched her, he finally, after two weeks of wondering about it on and off, realized what it was that had prompted him to spare her: She just didn't care.

It wasn't that she didn't care about what she was doing. In fact, she cared so much about whatever she had set her mind on — revenge against Garlotte, standing up to Theo — that she didn't care about the consequences. That night on the dock, she hadn't run. Sure, after the explosion she'd been knocked senseless, but she hadn't run before, when Theo wouldn't have known to chase her. And tonight she wasn't cowed by facing an archon who could, quite justifiably, put her down. Confidence? Fatalism? Stupidity? Balls? Whatever exactly it was, it could take her a long way ... or it could get her killed. Really soon.

"Is there anything else you can tell me about the guy?" Theo asked when Katrina realized that he was watching her, studying her.

She glowered at him for a long moment, then sighed. "Yeah. He's ugly. Not Nossie ugly, but ugly. When I saw him, he needed a shave and a shower. Receding hairline. And he couldn't keep his fuckin' hands to himself."

Katrina seemed to grow angry at the thought. "He kept, like... not feelin' me up or anything, but touchin' my arm when he was talkin' to me. Gave me the creeps. I went home and took a shower." Theo waited, but Katrina just smiled sarcastically and shrugged.

"That's it, cowboy. You know what I know. Now what? Lights out?"

Theo laughed, and enjoyed the fact that that seemed to make her angry all over again.

"You must be the luckiest damn person in the world for nobody to have killed you already."

"Yeah, yeah," Theo cut her off. "We're all dead already. Save it, sister. Look. I told you once to get the hell out of Baltimore, and I guess it turned out okay that you didn't. But you're damn lucky that whoever set you up for this didn't decide to clean up afterward.

Why, I don't know. Unless he figured you were stupid enough to get yourself killed without his help — which ain't too far from the truth."

Theo pointed a beefy finger at Katrina, and she stopped mid-protest.

"I can do whatever the fuck I want, that's what I can do," Theo said. "And this is what I want to do." He stood there for a few seconds, finger stretched toward Katrina like a dagger. The slightest signs of hesitance crept into her face, her posture. Then Theo took an old newspaper, a half-finished crossword, from the counter, and a pen that was lying nearby. He tore a small strip from the paper and jotted down a name. He held the strip of paper toward Katrina. Very cautiously, she took it from him.

"What?"

"We're all —"

"Well, you can — "

"This is what you do," Theo said. "You get that girl that was here ... what's her name?"

"You get Angela. You steal a car if you have to, and you drive. West. You drive at night.

She drives during the day. You ride in the damn trunk. You change your name, and you stay the hell away from here, away from the East Coast. Go to San Francisco. Ask around till you find that guy," Theo pointed at the slip of paper he'd handed her. "You should be able to find him around the docks."

Katrina looked at the name on the paper. "Friend of yours?"

"No. Matter of fact, don't mention my name or he'll kick your fuckin' ass and dump you in the Bay. You don't know me. Leave me out of it, he'll prob-ably help you get set up out there. Got it?"

"And I mean tonight. I mean you're gone in the next hour, the next half fuckin' hour. You don't listen to me this time..."

Theo waited, glared at her long enough to make sure that she was taking him seriously, then he turned and walked past the splintered pieces of door and door frame that littered the living-room floor.

Outside, the drug dealers scattered at the sight of him. Fatalistic or not, they could see death walking, and, this time, they were smart enough to get away.

"Angela."

"Uh... yeah."

"Right. All right."

Tuesday, 26 October 1999, 10:15 PM Presidential Suite, Lord Baltimore Inn Baltimore, Maryland Anton Baas, head of Jan's security detail, regarded Theo for a moment with that aloof, European detachment that annoyed Theo so much. Then Baas nodded to one of the two men beside him — all three were ghouls — who slipped within the double doors to Jan's suite and reappeared a few seconds later to nod back at Baas. Baas opened the door wide and stepped aside for Theo to pass.

Inside, Pieterzoon and van Pel were seated at a table that held a sizeable stack of leatherbound ledgers. Jan removed his glasses, folded them, and slipped them into his breast pocket. He closed the portfolio before him and placed it atop the stack of its mates.

"Theo, I was expecting you," Jan said. "I imagine we have much to discuss."

At least, Theo thought, the Ventrue wasn't pretending that nothing had happened last night. "I imagine that too," Theo said.

"That will be all for now, Hans," Jan said. He and Theo watched each other closely, neither speaking or moving, as van Pel gathered together the ledgers and showed himself out.

"How long has she been here?" Theo asked as soon as the doors closed.

The answer seemed truthful enough to Theo, and that in itself was something. It would have been easy enough for Jan to dangle some assuaging lie about how they were going to let Theo in on the secret in just another night or two.

"Theo, I did not know more than a few nights in advance that she would be arriving, and I was given explicit instructions to say nothing. To anyone."

Theo took the seat that van Pel had vacated. Jan's explanation seemed likely enough — not that that meant it was true. The truth could just as easily be that this was a line to insulate Jan from the subterfuge, to keep Theo on board and happy.

"Two weeks," Theo said. "So she got here just before Garlotte's big bang. Her idea? Yours?"

Jan's eyes narrowed, almost quizzically. He was not the least insulted by the suggestion.

"Because he would never agree to the plan? No. Though that was actually one of the reasons for her coming. I did not have great hopes for your embassy to Garlotte that night.

I also thought, as did the justicar, that I had perhaps expended as much of the prince's favor as was wise and that a new, more highly and more officially placed voice was called for. No, we did not destroy Garlotte. We were quite surprised by that turn of events, in fact, and not greatly pleased. The justicar could have persuaded him to accept the plan."

Shit. Theo kicked himself for not seeing that one. But it was so easy to assume the worst, most devious motivations after discovering deception — easy, and often correct. Not this time. Maybe. Theo had even suspected Jan of being the spy, and though he hadn't disproved it, the Brujah had to believe that Lucinde wouldn't be working closely with the bastard if there was any question of his passing on information to the Sabbat.

"I couldn't tell you any of this last night," Jan said. "Not with Hesha there. Not with Lucinde "Tell Pieterzoon I'm here."

"Not long. Two weeks."

"When were you gonna tell me?"

"There was no need." there too, really. She would prefer to play the hand closer to our vest."

"Why did you support me when it would have been easier to take Garlotte's side, or that of Lladislas, your clansman?"

Theo didn't answer at first. He sat back in his chair, crossed his arms, then said, "We needed somebody from outside, somebody with broader connections, somebody less provincial."

"My thoughts exactly. In short, you chose what you thought would be most effective for our cause, despite whatever you thought about me. I don't have illusions that we'll leave this city, this situation, and exchange postcards. I'm not speaking with you tonight out of any sense of friendship or altruism, and I know you'd never expect that. But no matter what our respective justicars may think, I think that you will be the most service to the Camarilla if you know the broader picture."

Theo's first impulse was anger. Who the fuck was this Ventrue to tell him, an archon, about the broader picture? But, Theo realized quickly, Lucinde seemed to have taken Jan into her confidence, and that might provide information from a circle that would otherwise be kept from even an archon. No point getting pissed off and being insulted.

"Okay then," Theo said. "You said talkin' to Garlotte was one reason she came. What were the others?"

"That was the primary reason she wanted to be physically present, but she's also been quite helpful in my negotiations with the Giovanni. Isabel and her folk proved resistant to my Boston gambit. I'm afraid that Jacques Gauthier was less than adequate as an envoy. At any rate, with Lucinde's backing, I was able to exact the concessions we require from the Giovanni-"

Jan, on the other hand, seemed to relish divulging the details of this particular scheme. He was proud of his accomplishment — that, Theo noted, might be something he could use against the Ventrue some night, if the need arose. "A few like-minded financiers can indeed produce miracles — provided they are the right financiers and are amenable to guidance." Jan rubbed his hands together. "Several strategic sell-offs were sufficient to spark a rapid devaluation of the Italian lira and, not coincidentally, to convince certain individuals within Clan Giovanni that it was in their best interests to agree to a few limited and reasonable requests. It wasn't even a risk to the Masquerade, really. The only thing that collapses in Italy more often than the exchange rate is the government."

"What about Hesha?" Theo pressed, less than interested in exchange rates. "A Setite doesn't offer a token of goodwill unless he's gonna get something out of it."

"Hesha actually approached us. He did bring the information regarding Garlotte's childe, but that was less significant than what he was able to offer about the Eye of Hazimel."

"Not what, whom. Or perhaps what applies as well. Hazimel. According to legend, an ancient Ravnos, a stone mason by some accounts, who ruled much of India. Pre-history. He extended his domain by bestowing his Eye upon a succession of rulers in exchange for their loyalty."

"Then why are you tellin' me?" Theo challenged him.

"How?" Theo was skeptical.

"Just like a Ventrue?" Jan asked with a wry grin.

"Same ballpark."

"The Eye of what?"

"Shit. So that was his Antediluvian ... and the Leopold guy that Victoria went lookin' for..."

"Exactly. Hesha evidently knows a great deal about this Eye and ...Lucinde has offered our cooperation in this matter."

"She what?" Theo asked in measured tones. Jan studiously removed his glasses from his pocket and began to clean them. "What the hell is she thinkin', workin' with a Setite? I don't like it."

"Good," Theo said, then shook his head and muttered, "Workin' with a Setite..."

"There is something else about last night that we must discuss," Jan said, putting his glasses back on.

"— Who gave her the explosives," Jan finished the Brujah's sentence. "A Kindred who may or may not be named Johnny. She told you how to contact him, and then you sent her to San Francisco. She followed your advice, by the way ... this time."

This time. That meant that Jan knew about the last time, on the dock, and about everything that Theo and Katrina had said last night. This is a set-up, Theo thought instantly. Blackmail, maybe. But then why, he wondered, would the Ventrue have gone to all the trouble of briefing Theo about Lucinde, or why would Jan have bothered fabricating such elaborate lies? Was it possible that Jan wasn't after blackmail? It would be risky after all. Theo could simply bull his way through, argue jurisdiction and bullshit like that — but if Lucinde, a justicar, threw her support behind Jan's accusations...

Theo tried to absorb all that. The Nosferatu had been trailing the Sabbat who'd given Katrina the explosives. That meant that they would've been following her the night she blew up Garlotte. "They saw it all, didn't they, the sewer rat fuckers."

"Why the hell didn't you say anything before?" But as soon as Theo asked the question, he knew the answer — and it set the fire burning deep in his belly once again. "You thought I put her up to it."

"And the Eye..."

"Quite powerful," Jan assured him.

"Like what Xaviar was talkin' about."

"Quite possibly."

"Nor do I." But resignation was obvious in Jan's voice.

"She can offer your cooperation...."

"I don't foresee that the matter will involve you at all."

Theo nodded. "Katrina. I found her. She told me —"

"Nossie followin' me?" Theo asked.

"Not you, actually. Her."

"Katrina? Since when?"

"Since she met with a local Sabbat operative."

"Johnny."

"He generally goes by Jack."

Jan nodded.

"The possibility existed," Jan said evenly. "Why else would you let her walk away?"

Good fucking question, Theo thought. It was one that he'd just begun to come to grips with, and he didn't think it would make much sense to someone in Jan's position, an establishment man. Even if Theo felt inclined to explain, which he did not.

Jan frowned. "Is anything really just a 'city matter' in the middle of a war?"

"Hey, if Garlotte can't keep his young'ns in line, fuck him. If Goldwin can't straighten it out, then fuck him too." The fire was growing. Theo didn't show it externally, but he was wishing more and more that this was a problem he could beat into submission, that he could just rip Jan's head off and be done with it. But it wasn't that simple. It never was.

Theo had thought Jan was the spy; Jan had thought Theo was the spy. How the fuck were they supposed to prevail over the Sabbat when nobody on their own side was ever above suspicion? What was it about the blood, about the curse of Caine, that made them all such arrogant, shifty, devious, deceitful bastards? Or was that the real curse, and the blooddrinking was just symptomatic?

Jan ran a hand through his spiky blond hair. He took his glasses off, tucked them back into his pocket again, and started massaging the bridge of his nose. "I didn't doubt you, Theo. It was so unlikely ... and after the success we've had..."

Theo held the fire in check, fought it back down, but not without effort. "So the whole thing with Katrina last night," Theo said, "it was a ... set-up. A test."

"If I did her in, then I was covering up. Turn her over to you and I'm okay. So tell me," Theo leaned forward in his chair until only about two feet separated his face and Jan's, "where do I stand after hustlin' her off to the other side of the country?"

"You have our trust," Jan said in measured tones. He seemed to sense that, if last night had been Theo's test, tonight was his own. "Why else would I tell you what I've told you?"

"If what you've told me is true," Theo said. Slowly, he eased back in his chair. It made sense. It would have been much easier for Jan to say nothing than to conceive such elaborate lies. Theo took a cigarette from his jacket, lit up, swallowed the smoke, didn't let it back out.

For several minutes, the two Kindred sat in silence, Jan alternately cleaning his glasses and massaging the bridge of his nose, Theo staring at the floor, thinking, fuming. Jan wasn't the enemy, not the real enemy, Theo kept reminding himself. It was all just part of this fucked-up world he inhabited where blood was food and sunlight was death. He and all his kind were monsters living on human blood-but there were worse monsters, those that had forgotten, forsaken, their distant humanity. The worst of them were among the Sabbat. They were the enemy. They were the ones who would treat mortals like they were slaves, like they were animals. Jan was not the real enemy.

Jan seemed to sense Theo's gradual calming and spoke again. "After the explosion, Colchester came to Lucinde and me. He told us about your being there and letting the girl go free. I found it ... odd. But not treacherous. Lucinde wasn't so sure."

"Because there's a spy out there," Theo said. "She thought I was the spy?"

Theo just nodded his head, more sickened than surprised — another secret, more information kept from him that could have been useful.

"Not my job to clean up city matters," Theo said.

"A test," Jan acknowledged. "Yes."

"No. We'd already determined the identity of the spy."

"Lucinde wanted to make sure that you weren't in league with the spy," Jan explained.

"Just to cover every angle, she spoke with Pascek. He said to test you however we could, to make sure that you were completely loyal."

Pascek. Paranoid motherfucker. Theo didn't tense a single muscle; he didn't scream or curse aloud. He just filed it all away, pushed it all down to be fuel for the fire when he needed it next.

"If you had wanted Katrina silenced," Jan said, "you would have destroyed her. I held to that the night of the explosion. I hold to that now."

"Okay," said Theo. He laid his palms flat against the table. "So you stood up for me, and Lucinde and my boss, like most justicars, are paranoid bastards. So fuckin' what? Where does that leave us now, if all the bullshit games are over?"

Friday, 29 October 1999, 1:23 AM Hemperhill Road Baltimore, Maryland Theo stood by the mantelpiece staring into the huge, gold-framed mirror that dominated the study. The room was furnished with antiques, every piece. He couldn't name the style of the chairs or the exact period of the porcelain vases or even of the overall motif. The decor was old, older easily than Theo. Old and expensive. But Theo had seen older. He'd spent years traveling with Don Cerro in Europe, meeting many of the old and powerful Kindred to whom these antiques would be little better than patio furniture.

Those years of study — study of casual excess, of how stagnant Kindred society could become over time — had been good for him. They had shown him that injustice and cruelty existed everywhere, even beyond the slave plantations of the American South, even for whites. Oppression was not the exception, it was the norm. Those years had sparked the realization that the fire was not always enough, not even the fire fueled by hunger.

In the halls of power, creatures existed to whom years were playthings and the real world was a distant, dangerous thing. Yet the real world had a way, on occasion, of making its presence known, of asserting itself. Theo had not been around for the Anarch Revolt or for the first wars against the Sabbat, but reality had intruded upon the elders with a vengeance. Change, so long held at bay, had come crashing down upon them, an avalanche sweeping all before it. Perhaps another time like that was at hand. The Final Nights, Xaviar had said. And even though the Gangrel had been wrong about his supposed Antediluvian, events in these modem nights were moving at an accelerated, alarming pace. The world could not be kept at bay. Not forever.

Behind Theo, among the antiques, sat Marcus Vitel, deposed prince of Washington, D.C. He wore an expensively cut suit, more old-fashioned than the type Pieterzoon tended to wear, with a small golden eagle pinned to his lapel. Vitel had enough gray streaking his dark hair to make him look distinguished among a group of mortals — if he chose to consort with mortals any longer. He still appeared strong of body and mind, but the loss of his city and perhaps of his childer had left him visibly bitter. His dark blue eyes had a hard glint.

As he had for much of his stay in Baltimore, he remained aloof from other Kindred, royalty tossed among the commoners. He often, but not always, attended the council meetings, which themselves had grown less frequent. Otherwise, however, Vitel kept to himself, creating an expanding circle of ghouls to meet his needs and wants.

"Do you feel it is wise," Vitel asked, "to fall back so close to the city?"

Theo scratched the stubble on his chin as he answered, and continued to watch Vitel in the ex-panse of the minor. "The shorter the lines we have to watch, the stronger our defenses can be. We stay spread wide, they slip through. We pull tight, nothin' gets through."

"But if they do get through," Vitel protested, "they are in the city proper. We must press our lines forward, not withdraw them so the enemy can strike swiftly at our heart."

Theo shook his head, patiently but firmly. "We can't match them for manpower. We're taking some losses every night. Others of our folks are kinda melting away. Not a lot, but it's starting. They can see the writing on the wall. We've gotta concentrate our force, just like pulling folks in from Buffalo and Hartford."

"We'll keep a screen around the airport," Theo said. "When the big push comes — and it's looking sooner every night, judging by what they're throwin' at us-those who can afford it and have it set up ahead of time, yourself, Pieterzoon, Gainesmil, maybe a few others, you guys'll jet out. Everybody else," Theo shrugged, "this has gotta be it. We'll never get "But surely we must have contingencies, the airport — " this many Kindred together and more or less organized again. We've let slip talk about some escape routes to the north — ground runs to Pittsburgh and Phillie — but that's just to sooth some nerves. Those orders will never happen. We make our stand here. In Baltimore.

But we wanted to keep you informed, 'case you wanted to line up a plane or anything."

Vitel sat quietly, his hands and interlocked fingers resting in his lap. "If Baltimore falls, there is little chance of getting Washington back."

Theo turned from the mirror, leaned back against the mantel, and crossed his arms. "I agree," he said. "It would be a longshot, even with the Tremere chantry holdin' out in D.C.

But I think we can hold on here. We have to. We shorten the lines, make sure we're not broken. Pieterzoon's sources say the Sabbat high command is gettin' antsy now that Monçada's out of the picture. We figure time is on our side. We hold out long enough, those bastards'll start slittin' each other's throats and forget all about us."

Vitel pondered that, nodded thoughfully. "The Sabbat is not known for its solidarity," he agreed.

Sunday, 31 October 1999, 1:00 AM Sub-basement, Baltimore Convention Center Baltimore, Maryland Jan was not surprised to see Hans van Pel escorting Hesha along the concrete corridor precisely on time. The Setite had proven himself prompt, respectful, and professional — which was not to say that Jan trusted him the least little bit. But Lucinde had pronounced that they would deal with Ruhadze. Jan could see how, from her perspective, it might seem that keeping the Setite happy was the best way to forestall his interference in the plans that were now unfolding. From Jan's view, however, accommodating Hesha was at best a distraction from far weightier matters; matters that, should they sour, the blame would undoubtedly fall squarely upon Jan. Not to mention the fact that he doubted Lucinde's underlying assumption that anything they did would prevent the Setite from tampering. Could the Eye really mean that much to Ruhadze, that he would forego his natural proclivity, namely treachery?

The Eye of Hazimel. It had proved extremely potent, if Xaviar's account of the Gangrel massacre was given credence. Why then, Jan wondered, hand the device — an actual eye; how macabre-to a Setite? Perhaps Lucinde merely wished to aid Hesha by hastening his journey to his own doom. Reasonable enough.

Whatever her reasons, though, Jan was left to play his part. He'd arranged the meeting that Ruhadze had requested. The Ventrue felt much more comfortable in this facility than he had three months ago in a sub-basement of the Wesleyan Building, where he had met with the Nosferatu underlings of Marston Colchester, who had arranged the employ of a certain Lasombra antitribu. That basement had been a maze of puddles, exposed pipes, and, Jan had gleaned, Nosferatu deathtraps. This non-public level of the Convention Center, on the other hand, was, if austere, at least dry, clean, and well lit. Colchester was here personally this time, in his guess of mild-mannered, well-dressed, African-American businessman.

Ruhadze, as usual, was tastefully and expensively dressed, black turtleneck and slacks, camel's-hair jacket. The monocle, a thin chain trailing to his jacket pocket, was propped before his left eye. The syncopated tap of his silver-handled cane fell precisely between the clicks of his shoes, each of the three distinct sounds echoing slightly from the bare cement corridor. Van Pel's footfalls, though louder, lacked the musical quality of the Setite's. Hesha carried a leather attaché case in his left hand.

"Mr. Pieterzoon." Hesha nodded to Jan and to Colchester, but no further introductions were extended.

"You won't mind if we observe from the adjacent room?" asked Jan.

Van Pel opened the door by which they were standing and gestured for Hesha to enter.

Hesha stepped inside the room and the door closed behind him. The only furnishings were a large metal table and three folding metal chairs, two of which were occupied. A wide mirror took up most of one wall. Behind it, in the next room, Jan Pieterzoon, Marston Colchester, and Pieterzoon's ghoul, van Pel, would be watching, listening, recording.

The two men seated at the table were the ones Hesha had asked to meet. He could have contacted them directly, of course, but the political circumstances were somewhat "Good evening, Mr. Ruhadze," Jan said.

"By all means." unsettled at present, and Calebros had suggested that Hesha go through what he called "proper channels." The advice had seemed reasonable enough — aside from which Hesha wanted to keep in the good graces of his Nosferatu allies-so the Setite consented. Little had he known that he would end up dealing with a justicar. Hesha was neither intimidated nor impressed by Lucinde's station-though impressed upon him were the implications of her very presence and the secrecy of it. Something unusual was definitely afoot, and Hesha would as always keep a sharp eye. For from war always arose opportunity for the prepared.

"Gentlemen," Hesha said to the two Kindred, "I thank you for agreeing to see me this evening."

Roughneck and Quaker looked on silently, suspiciously, perhaps from general distrust of Hesha's clan. He had checked with his brethren in the area — the two Malkavians had neither grudges nor indebtedness toward any Setites in the area. Had the latter been the case, then Hesha would have contacted the two directly, no matter what Calebros had recommended.

As Hesha moved closer and took his seat across from them, he became aware of a faint but distinct odor — that of dumpster refuse. It was not so pungent as the fecal odor that many Nosferatu, through preference or artifice, cultivated, and it suggested unlife spent not in the sewers but on the streets. Each man looked the part of the vagrant. Both wore oversized, threadbare clothing, worn and dirty. Both were unshaven and unkempt. Roughneck's beard was long enough that he tucked the very bottom tip of it into his belt. The role of mendicant was one that Hesha had affected upon occasion when necessary, but these two Malkavians seemed to come by it honestly.

Hesha removed from his attaché case a folder and placed it before him on the table. "I have some pictures I would like to show you. I am willing to compensate you — in addition to what you'll receive for coming tonight, of course — for anything you might be able to tell me about them."

The Setite opened the folder. The pictures were from the cave in New York that he and Ramona had each visited twice. The girl was still in New York, in the city. She had been less than excited by the prospect of flying, and there would have been little reason for her to accompany Hesha at any rate. Of course, he had not suggested that to her. If he'd told her to stay where she was, she probably would have fought to come to Baltimore. The girl was not ignorant, but she was rash and headstrong — one might even say obstinate to a remarkable degree; Hesha had said that and much more to himself. Ramona possessed all the follies of her youth, her clan, and her temperament. She was a quick study, but Hesha wondered if she would survive long enough to learn what she needed to know.

He had not brought the pictures of the statue with which she had tampered. That work of perfection and genius had nothing to do with the Malkavians. There was madness amidst the sculpted rock, the fused bodies, but it was an insanity far darker and more pervasive even than that exhibited by the descendants of Malkav. The sculpture was an emanation of the mad Toreador Leopold, his tortured artist's soul physically rendered. There were implications for the Eye there, if Hesha could puzzle them out. Hesha would not risk revealing those photographs to these Kindred or, more importantly, to those beyond the mirror.

The pictures that he had brought, that were before him on the table, were rather the legacy of the Prophet of Gehenna. Much of the cave had been covered by the writing, the unintelligible scrawl, penned in Anatole's own blood. Hesha had taken a sample of the vitae, and he had taken the pictures of the bloodsigns, but he could no more translate the marks than unravel the mysteries of the Prophet's blood. A linguist — among many other skills — by trade, and fluent in or familiar with literally dozens of languages and dialects, Hesha could not read the scrawl. He could sense meaning, but he could not penetrate the seemingly random array of pictograms, runes, sigils, and — for the lack of any discernible paradigm — scribbles. Though he could not be certain, Hesha's instinct told him that Anatole had created the sanguinary panorama, had used his own arm as stylus and his own blood as ink. Who else could have so mutilated Anatole, if not himself? Leopold, with the Eye? Possible. But Hesha could not overcome the impression that the statue and the writing were fashioned by different hands, that the statue was the welling up of some great ... malignancy, and that Anatole had found it, had imparted his own revelation — for those who could unravel it.

Let those see who have eyes, the Biblical prophets often said — the words more often than not spoken to the unfortunate masses, the predestined, the damned, who were doomed not to see.

Hesha slid the photographs across the table to those who shared, if not the prophet's power, at least Anatole's affliction. The Setite intended to watch carefully for any minute signs of recognition, for the slightest indication that either of the two Malkavians knew what it was they were viewing; he was ready to read the most subtle nuances of their reactions.

He was not prepared for the chaos that suddenly engulfed him.

"Hm. Two-way mirror. Nice," Colchester said, as he, Jan, and van Pel filed into the observation room. "I used to have one of these." The Nosferatu added, his demeanor, if not his visual disguise, reverting to its more usual, grotesque state. "My second wife liked to watch me bring other women home."

Jan sighed audibly. Colchester heard and also seemed to realize that he was rubbing his hands together in reminiscent glee. The Nosferatu cleared his throat, resumed his serious manner.

"Gentlemen, I thank you for agreeing to see me this evening," Hesha's voice came to them over a speaker by the mirror. Roughneck and Quaker regarded him warily.

"I have some pictures I would like to show you," Hesha said. "I am willing to compensate you...."

"No," Jan said. That was not part of the agreement that Lucinde had arranged. She apparently had no interest in the photographs and therefore had decided that there was no reason for Jan to see them. Or perhaps she had merely assumed that Jan would install a recessed camera over the table, which he had. There was no need to try to read over Hesha's shoulder. Everything would be reviewed in good time.

"My God, what's happening?" van Pel yelled in response to the sudden eruption of chairs, table, photographs and bodies on the other side of the mirror: The ghoul began at once for the door, but was stayed by Jan's hand on his shoulder.

"We are here for observation only, Hans," said Jan with rapt fascination, not once shifting his gaze from the room beyond the glass.

They're smarter than I thought, Jan mused.

"Have you seen the pictures?" Colchester asked.

At that moment, however, everything went haywire.

There were one hundred forty-seven photographs. Quaker glanced at the first for maybe two seconds, then flung himself back from the table with the force of a hurricane. His chair crumpled beneath him; his legs whipped upward, striking the underside of the table.

Hesha leapt back out of the way as the table up-ended and a geyser of photographs erupted into the air. Quaker's gyrations knocked his friend to the floor as Quaker himself landed hard on his back and head.

He convulsed, sharp violent spasms, and began to spit bloody, frothy drool.

"What'd you do?" Roughneck, climbing to his knees, yelled at Hesha. "What'd you do to him?"

Hesha prepared for violence. The bearded Malkavian started crawling toward him. Quaker was still writhing, his contortions growing more violent. He began vomiting vitae, his body heaving. He spewed a watery mix of blood and bile. It covered him, covered the floor and many of the pictures.

Roughneck, crawling toward Hesha, slipped on the mess. "What'd you do?" The Malkavian took one of the blood-splattered photographs, started to rip it apart in his hands, but stopped suddenly. He held it for a moment, staring, then slammed it down on the floor. He tried to smooth the folds and creases, to piece the ragged edges together; he pressed it compulsively against the floor, as if the blood there might hold the damaged paper together.

Hesha was trying to take it all in. After the first instant when Roughneck had started toward him, there seemed to be no immediate physical threat. But he could feel an energy in the air, an almost electrical charge. For an instant, the blood on the cold floor seemed to be boiling. Bubbling and spitting. But that had to be just Quaker's gurgling and coughing, spraying more droplets on what was already there. Had to be ... didn't it?

Roughneck, Hesha saw, was smearing the blood on the floor ... no, using his fingers to draw in it ... to write. As the Malkavian's eyes rolled up in his head, his fingers traced paths and left figures that Hesha recognized — that Hesha recognized but could not translate. Roughneck was reproducing exactly, one after another, the symbols from the cave walls, from the pictures — from the pictures that Roughneck had not yet seen!

Hesha glanced at the mirror. Pieterzoon and the others didn't seem inclined to intervene, and with a similar detachment, the Setite watched Roughneck and Quaker. Quaker's eyes remained rolled upward, only the bloodshot whites visible as he blinked uncontrollably. His tongue flicked from side to side like a live snake, and his teeth clamped down as if trying to capture — or kill — the creature. His own blood mingled on the floor with that of his companion. Roughneck continued writing, recreating Anatole's symbols, at the same time sliding over what he'd already written and smearing it beyond recognition.

While Roughneck scribbled in the blood, Quaker suddenly ceased convulsing. His body grew rigid, back arched. He hacked, expelling a clot of blood and phlegm from his throat, and then in a cracking, tortured voice he spoke: "The light ... the last of the fight ... it fades, fades ... high above, far far away. Night ... the Final Night. Walls too slick ... can't climb ... surrounded by bulging eyes, blank, bloated faces ... too slick ... can't climb."

Quaker began writhing again, scrabbling at the floor in terror. His fingers clawed at the bloody cement, nails digging into the floor, snapping, splintering.

Roughneck was now scooping into his arms all the photographs he could reach. They were torn and bloodstained, spread across the floor. He gathered together those he could, began tearing at them, stuffing the pieces into his mouth, swallowing, gagging, stuffing "The children!" Quaker shouted. "Down the well... they point the way... beneath the children... they are not yet quick... they point the way."

Hesha did not try to prevent Roughneck's destruction of the photographs. The Setite had copies. Neither did he attempt to unravel Quaker's ravings. Rather, Hesha depended on the tape recorder in his jacket, and the recordings that Pieterzoon was making.

Suddenly Quaker ceased thrashing; he grew perfectly still. "The children fear their shadow, but the shadow fades with the last of the light," he intoned. As unheralded as it had come about, his respite from terror ended, and Quaker again clawed frantically at the cement floor. "They show us the way!" he cried frantically, the last of his strength seemingly spent. "They show us ...light fading... Final Night.... the children."

And then Quaker was silent, still; Roughneck with him. And as Hesha looked on, the two Malkavians crumbled to dust, their bodies sifting away amidst the pooled blood and photographs from the cave.

Jan stood perfectly still and stared at the aftermath. Van Pel and Colchester did the same.

Several drops of blood had splattered against the minor and now seemed suspended in time between the two rooms — the present on this side of the glass: quiet, orderly, following predictably from what had preceded; the future on that side: blood-soaked chaos, incomprehensible warnings of doom.

What in the bloody hell...? Jan could not comprehend what he had seen, what he had heard. The room beyond the glass grew unfocused, the mangled photographs, the remains of the two Malkavians. Jan's gaze latched onto the suspended droplets of blood — the blood that would connect the present and the future.

In the end, it was Hesha who came to them. He opened the door to the observation room where they stood speechless.

Jan slowly turned his head, shifted his gaze from the suspended blood to look at him.

Ruhadze appeared completely unfazed. Jan nodded. Satisfied, Hesha left them. more into his mouth.

The children down the well.

"I would appreciate a copy of the tape," the Setite said.

Sunday, 31 October 1999,10:52 PM Presidential Suite, Lord Baltimore Inn Baltimore, Maryland Theo settled back into the plush couch. "How many times are you gonna ask me that?" he grumbled.

Jan didn't answer. He didn't need to. Theo hadn't given anything away, not that they were aware of, but neither had Vitel. There was every indication that Vitel had believed Theo — he had to have. If Vitel had seen through Theo's ruse, then they were doomed, and the Camarilla presence on the East Coast was a thing of the past. But if Vitel was convinced that Baltimore really was the last stand, then there might still be hope....

Jan found the digital video cassette he was looking for, slipped it into the player, and turned on the television. The picture that sprang to the screen was not of the best quality, but the image was clearly the exterior balcony of a hotel at night. The row of doors, aside from the sequential numbers, were identical. All of the curtains were drawn; some of the rooms behind the curtains were lighted, others not. The small white date in the corner of the screen indicated it had been filmed last night.

"This is one of Vitel's havens in the city," Jan said. "He alternates days among them. No apparent pattern. Colchester took these shots himself. We're lucky there was no woman who forgot to pull her curtain in a room nearby, or he would have fogged up the lens."

Theo laughed under his nonexistent breath. "Vitel has a block of eight rooms reserved permanently," Jan went on. "Ghouls stay in the others, but he..." Jan paused until a dark figure came into view, a tall man in a dark overcoat, his equally dark hair streaked with gray. "He stays in this one." The picture zoomed in as Vitel entered room 337. The door closed, and a light came on behind the curtain.

"Now," said Jan, picking up a remote control and fast forwarding through a couple of uneventful hours, then returning the tape to normal speed. As Theo and Jan watched, another figure moved into the picture, a disheveled man with dirty, receding hair.

"I haven't seen him before," Theo said, "but he could be the guy Katrina described."

From a shelf by the television Jan took a dossier and dropped it on the table in front of Theo. "He's our man," the Ventrue said. "Tzimisce. Active in the Sabbat around Baltimore and Washington for years. Leads a pack at times, but a bit of a loose cannon."

Theo thumbed through the thick file, looked at the pictures, skimmed the text. "Helluva body count he's racked up."

"And those are the ones we know about. He's the one that approached Katrina. He'd been flying under our radar until one of Colchester's people recognized him coming out of a meet with Vitel. A meeting very much..." Jan aimed the remote control again, rewound the scene slightly to show Jack skulking up the last few stairs, and then played it forward at normal speed. Jack knocked on the door of room 337. The door opened. Jack stepped inside, and the door closed.

Theo was not impressed. "Shit. You can't even see if it was Vitel that let him in. That the best Colchester could do?"

"He's the one," Jan insisted. "I can show you the footage from later last night when Jack drops off his message to Sascha Vykos in Washington, and other messages too, from the "Do you think he believed you?" Jan asked.

"Look familiar?" Jan asked.

Theo continued to flip through the dossier and scowled at the large TV screen. The seconds and minutes in the comer passed by. Jan stood silently and watched. After about twenty minutes, the door to 337 opened again, and Jack slipped out of the room and down the steps. He was carrying a large, folded envelope.

"How did Colchester's guy just happen to catch Jack, or Johnny, or who the hell ever he is, meeting with Vitel?" Theo asked. "Not this time, the first time."

Jan clicked off the television and moved with deliberate steps to a chair opposite Theo.

"After Hartford," Jan said, "we began a series of observations."

"Yes. Vitel was one of the subjects. We couldn't be sure whom to watch, so we cast a wide net."

Jan paused for a moment, but the hesitation removed any surprise from what Theo was about to hear. "All the principals," Jan said. "Vitel, Garlotte, Goldwin, Gainesmil, Lladislas, Quaker and Roughneck, Malachi... yourself..."

It didn't bother Theo to find out that he'd been spied upon like that. Why should it, after finding out about the test he'd been subjected to the other night, after finding out that his own boss, Pascek, had urged the Ventrue justicar to test him rather than standing up for him? Theo took it in stride. It all had the stink of Kindred politics, but he was the one who'd let himself wade so deep into the shit. It was one thing serving as archon for his sire while his sire was justicar. Theo hadn't had to stay on when Jaroslav succeeded Cerro. The archon could have walked away, but he hadn't. And all the maneuvering, which had never been pretty or nice under Cerro, had just gotten uglier and meaner with Pascek at the helm.

"Vitel is the one," Jan said quietly at last, trying to keep the meeting focused. "I have records of the meets with Jack, dates, times, locations, pictures, transcripts of some. You can see whatever you want."

Theo tossed the dossier back onto the table. "I want to see it," Theo said. "All of it. Every fuckin' thing you got." past few weeks."

"'We,"' Theo repeated. "You and Colchester."

"How wide?" Theo wanted to know. "Who else?"

Monday, 1 November 1999, 3:02 AM A subterranean grotto New York City, New York "Has Ruhadze shown you the pictures of the sculpture?" Emmett asked.

"No," Calebros said, shaking his head. A single candle struggled to illuminate the chamber of hewn rock. "The writing, Anatole's legacy, is more important, I think. I respect Hesha enough — "

"Hmph," Emmett snorted. "Respect a Setite. Augustin would puke in his grave."

"Don't speak of our sire in that tone. Or Hesha for that matter. In Bombay —"

"Bombay, shmombay. Give it a rest already." Emmett rolled his eyes.

"Do you want to look at the pictures we do have?" "Of the writing? The ones that turned the Malkavians into Shake 'n' Bake? No thanks."

"I looked at them," Calebros gently taunted him.

"Hesha looked at them. Even the Gangrel whelp did."

"Oh yeah? Well... good for you."

"Stunning retort."

"Up yours."

As usual, nothing straightforward about Prophet of Gehenna; as many perspectives as individuals involved.

Ramona claims hillside at cave scarred, ruinedwould seem to fit with Xaviar's account. But neither Hesha nor Jeremiah able to confirm. In fact, contradictory accounts.

Two Malkavians in Baltimore destroyed after looking at pictures, (barely!), yet others of us unscathed. Clan - I November 1999 re: legacy of Anatole specific response?

Sturbridge might have insight?

Jeremiah still somewhat troubled after his time with Anatole Monday, 1 November 1999,3:47 AM Cherry Hill Baltimore, Maryland "Hey, big sugah, I give you the ride of your life." That's what had started it, the prostitute's comment while Theo was pulled up to a stop sign.

He'd been riding through Katrina's neighborhood — what had been her neighborhood. He wasn't sure why exactly he was doing it. After leaving Pieterzoon, Theo had checked up on several patrols, which were going as well as could be expected with the Sabbat pressing northward a little more forcefully every week. One dumb-ass Kindred refugee from Charleston had tried to be a hero, tried to stop a drive-by single-handed and ended up half road kill, half hood ornament. Otherwise, things were relatively quiet. Theo had found Lydia and told her what he needed. Then he'd wandered for a little bit — and found himself here, in Katrina's old 'hood.

The prostitute wasn't really different from any of the others. Younger than some, not haggard and used up, not yet. Older than some of the others, the ones that didn't look old enough to be thinking about boys, much less pulling down their pants for them. She was heavier than a lot of them. Maybe she wasn't a junkie, not yet.

Her voice cut through the rumble of the bike's engine while Theo was idling at the stop sign. Without thinking, he reached over, grabbed her wrist, pulled her toward him.

"Babies shit all over the place. Get on," Theo growled. He couldn't stand to look at her there on the corner. She wore a tight, low-cut spandex top that slid down when she moved, giving a free preview of a large, dark nipple. Her skirt was short and hugged tightly against her bulging ass and thighs. Her spiked heels were tall enough to stake a Kindred.

She stopped to hike up her stockings before sliding one leg expertly over the seat and climbing on the bike behind Theo.

"Shut the fuck up." Theo found himself wanting to turn around and shake her, throttle her.

Is this the best you can do for yourself, sister? he thought. Is this why good people risked their lives and died? So you could sell yourself on the street corner, instead of somebody else selling you on the auction block?

He didn't want to know her name. He didn't want to acknowledge that she existed. For a brief moment, as he pulled away from the curb, he wanted to fool himself, to pretend that that comer would remain free of anyone like her for more than just an hour or so. This was the real world, but it was the worst of the real world. At least when Master Bell had crept down to the slave quarters in the dark of night, Theo's mother and sisters had had no choice. They had been dependent on that man for their lives and the safety of their family. He had taken from them; they had not given.

But then, as Theo felt the prostitute's arms latching onto his broad chest, he saw again "Hey, big sugah..."

"You wanna play rough, sugah?'' she teased him.

He checked her arm. No tracks. Checked the other arm.

"I'm clean as a baby's bottom," she said.

"I'll make you happy, sugah," she purred in his ear.

"You wanna know my name, sugah?"

"No."

"Suit yourself." everything else that was around. Clusters of hopeless people, desperate people, selling drugs because there was nothing else to do, no opportunity, no jobs, not here.

Then get the hell out of here, Theo thought. Or get on the damn bus and go find a job.

But he knew it was never that simple. Some of them were just evil, predators. Theo had known enough people, Kindred and kine, to know that. Eat food, drink blood, didn't really matter. Some individuals existed for no other reason than to prey on others. But some were just lost, overwhelmed by a world they didn't understand. In the city, these people couldn't just go out and work in the field; and without an education getting a job anywhere, bus or no bus, was next to a miracle. The only greater miracle was surviving long enough to get that education, surviving intellectually and morally in a culture that didn't encourage or reward that kind of achievement, in a world where decisions made so early in life so often led to jail time, pregnancy, death. Meanwhile Pieterzoon, and his mortal counterparts, flaunted their wealth, their connections, their power, like that was their birthright.

Theo kept driving. Knowing what he did still did not ease his resentment of the woman sitting behind him. He had been born in the lowest part of this sick world, but he had risen above it. He had refused to accept the status quo. He'd had injustice after injustice heaped upon him: his family split up when he was barely five years old, his mother, some of his brothers and sisters sold away from his father and other siblings; Theo's mother and sisters raped while he, chased from the slave quarters, shivered in the darkness outside.

Theo could recollect every night that it had happened. Every single night. He remembered. He remembered being whipped as well. Some of the scars still marked his back. He could recall how many lashes he'd taken on each occasion and which overseer had administered the punishment. Theo had found them all, one at a time, years later, and evened that score. The memories had driven Theo; the offenses against his dignity had led him to led him to assert his right to determine, as much as possible, his own destiny.

But that was not the case with the broken individuals whom he saw around him on the streets of these modem nights. What the fuck was wrong with these people? How could the world acknowledge their humanity if they didn't acknowledge it themselves? Black men shooting black men. Impoverished families, shattered by drugs, living in filth. Self-respect, Theo had long ago decided, stemmed from empowerment, but empowerment thrived only with self-respect. That was the problem. To break out of the self-destructive cycle of hopelessness and victimization and into the self-sustaining cycle of empowerment and selfsufficiency. In his own mortal life, Theo had taken the initiative to break from one cycle to the other, and from that first step everything else had followed. He had escaped slavery, had returned time and again to the South to help others escape, and when Don Cerro had imparted the gift — what Theo had then considered a gift — of unimaginable power, Theo had broadened his activities from mere redemption of those in need to revenge against those in charge. He'd taken the whip to Master Bell, and worse. But seeking revenge, Theo found, was adding fuel to the fire that had always burned within him, the fire that mingled with his newfound hunger until they were one and the same. Old Master Bell was not the only one to pay for his crimes. Many of the Bell slaves did as well. Many members of Theo's family.

Theo flinched at the sound of the voice so close to him. It took him a second to orient himself, to remember that he was riding the rough streets of Baltimore, not the hidden back roads of Mississippi. He turned down a dark, deserted side street, turned between two buildings and stopped the bike. The woman got off, smoothed her clothes.

"Where you wanna go, sugah?'' Theo got off the motorcycle. "You got kids?"

She smiled, ran a finger down the sleeve of Theo's leather jacket. "You don't wanna talk 'bout kids." There was a small smudge of bright red lipstick on one of her front teeth.

Before he realized he was doing it, Theo grabbed her hand and squeezed, not breaking her fingers, but the woman cried out in pain. "Do you have kids?" he demanded.

"Yeah ... yes!" Her fear caught up with her pain as she looked into his eyes. Tears started streaming down her cheeks.

"Two," she cried. She began trembling all over. Her teeth chattered together. Her lipstick was smeared somehow. The cool, damp air seemed suddenly to bite all the way to her bones, to sap her strength, but she was sweating. She tried to pull away but couldn't.

The fire rose up within Theo. He hated this woman who was both symptom and cause of evil. Still holding her, he turned her face roughly with his other hand, and then tore into the taut flesh at the base of her neck. Blood filled his mouth, her blood, her basic humanity, same as anyone else's. Her frantic scream died away to a pathetic whimper, but still her heart pumped spurt after spurt of fresh blood into Theo. He drew strength from she who lacked strength. He drank greedily to quench the fire, to extinguish the hate and pity he felt for her.

In the end, though he was full, he felt completely spent. He licked the wound closed and let go of her. She stumbled a few steps before her knees buckled and she landed hard on the ground. She sat, dazed, tears wet on her cheeks.

Theo stood over her. He still hated her for what she was, for her weakness. He hated himself for the compassion he couldn't find in his heart. These were his people, yet he was one of the predators. He knew he'd need the blood in the nights ahead, but he didn't like to feed like this. But she had spoken to him. She had asked him to make her a victim. He could not change her. He could not save her from herself. She would be back on the street, tomorrow night or the night after. If she pulled herself out somehow, there would be others.

Theo reached into his pocket, pulled out a wad of twenty-dollar bills. He peeled off five, six, tossed them at her. They landed by her knee. Her stocking was torn. Angry but tired, Theo climbed back onto his bike and left her there.

"How many?"

Monday, 1 November 1999, 11:44 PM Dewey's Sweatshop, Park Heights Baltimore, Maryland Lydia stepped into the joint for the second time in two nights. Cigarette smoke hung thick, and the jukebox was cranked up loud playing ZZ Top. The bartender, busy enough with the six or so guys at the bar, didn't appear to notice her. He was fat and greasy. It wasn't hot in the room, but his shirt was stained with sweat on the chest, back, and armpits. Two of the patrons at the bar were familiar to Lydia: Frankie and Baldur. They were each nursing a beer, taking a sip every now and then and generally keeping busy not noticing Lydia, although they were sitting near the front door.

A couple of hard-up-looking types were sitting by themselves at two tables, but the other tables were empty. Lydia picked one and took a seat with her back to the wall. Almost before she'd touched ass to seat, one of the guys from the bar was sidling over to her table. He was the kind who seemed more cocky than successful with women. He wore a threadbare army jacket and had thinning red hair.

"Buy you a drink, beautiful?" He gave her a wink that he must have thought was suave.

Lydia sighed. "What do I look like, president of the Hair Club for Assholes?" He laughed.

Lydia did not.

"That's good. That's good. Come on, gorgeous, let me buy you a drink. I'm just trying to be friendly." He pulled out the chair opposite Lydia and made himself at home.

"I don't need no more friends," Lydia said. She glanced at his couple of drinking buddies at the bar, who did piss-poor jobs of pretending that they weren't watching. "Besides," Lydia added, "I don't go for guys." She tried not to laugh as his smile drained away. The lesbian ploy was always good for some mileage, and her statement, as far as it went, was mostly true these nights. Sex just wasn't what it used to be.

Her visitor, after his initial surprise, managed a forced smile. "Don't go for guys? You just haven't met the right one." He winked again.

Lydia rolled her eyes. She took a second to look around the room at the other patrons.

Aside from Frankie and Baldur, they all seemed to be mortal: coloring was right, they were drinking too much to be faking it. She turned back to her guest. "And you would be the right one?"

Lydia sighed again. She looked at her watch and decided she didn't have time for this.

"Okay, sport. Let's arm wrestle for it."

"Arm wrestle. You know...." She propped her right arm up on the table. "You win, you and your buddies can stretch me out on the bar and take turns fucking my brains out. I win, you piss off."

He laughed, but his grin now was more suspicious than confident. He hesitated, gave a good hard look at the small, pale woman across from him, then laughed again. "Okay, baby. You're on, and you're in for the time of your life."

He put his elbow on the table and made a big production of caressing her fingers when he took her hand.

"You bet your little lacy panties."

He was taken aback by the suggestion. "Huh?"

"Yeah, whatever."

He took a deep breath and started pushing just before he said, "Go."

Lydia let him have about three inches, just to get his hopes up, then slammed his knuckles onto the table top.

"Were you ready?" Lydia asked, full of concern. "I couldn't feel you pushing."

"Tell you what, sport. just to be fair, why don't we go left handed, double or nothing. You win, you and your boys can fuck me, then turn me over and fuck me in the ass. Sound good?"

He glared at her from across the table, spoke menacingly in a low growl, "You're gonna regret this, you fucking bitch."

Lydia shrugged. "Maybe. Put your money where your mouth would like to be." She propped her left arm up on the table.

His pause was longer this time. His friends at the bar no longer made any pretense of being disinterested. Some kind of trick, he had to figure. She'd tricked him somehow. But not twice. He pulled up his sleeve, put his left arm on the table, grasped her hand with a firm grip, no suggestive foreplay.

He didn't say go this time, just started pressing with all this strength. Lydia held him at straight vertical for five seconds... ten ... fifteen. A vein was bulging at his temple. He gasped and sucked in air. Lydia grimaced, then all the strain left her face. "Tsk, tsk, tsk.

Maybe you should try two hands," she said.

Surprised and totally crestfallen, he only had another second before she slammed his knuckles against the table. He was leaning in so hard that a joint or ligament or something made a loud popping noise. He roared in pain and frustration and grabbed his elbow.

"Think twice, sport," she said very quietly, and he stopped partway up. "That was just your elbow. You touch me again, I'll rip off your dick and stuff it up your fuckin' ass."

He paused for a few seconds, hovering between up and down, holding his elbow.

"That's better," Lydia said. "Now, why don't you go home to your wife or your girlfriend or your thirteen-year-old neighbor, whoever it is you fuck, and smack her around? You'll feel like a big man again. Everything'll be okay."

Without looking at his friends, he eased up out of his chair and hurried awkwardly out of the bar. His drinking buddies, with raised eyebrows, turned back to their drinks. Frankie and Baldur, less surprised, turned back to their drinks as well.

Lydia glanced at her watch again. 11:56. She'd come here last night, after she'd talked to Theo, and asked the fat bartender if Johnny was around. When he wasn't, she'd handed the bartender a note that said simply, "11:45 pm." So where the fuck is he? she wondered.

Frankie and Baldur had been here early to get a good spot. They would have let her know if he'd already shown up and left, or if something weird had happened. But there they were, sipping on their beers, arguing very quietly and reasonably about whether or not "Whenever you're ready," Lydia said, "just say the word."

"Ow! Shit!"

"How the hell did you — ?"

"Whenever you're ready, sport."

"That didn't sound good, sport."

He glared threateningly at Lydia and started to stand.

Lydia didn't have to wait much longer. When the door opened a few minutes later, he came inside the bar — the guy whose picture Theo had showed her. He was dirty and unshaven with seriously receding hair. He shuffled more than walked and was kind of hunched over a little, not like some Nossie freak, just a normal, lowlife scumbag. He looked around and seemed puzzled, then ambled over to the bar, where he exchanged a few words with the bartender. The bartender pointed toward Lydia, and "Johnny" looked her way. Lydia met his gaze evenly, didn't smile, didn't blow him a kiss, didn't flick him off.

He shuffled over to the table with a sneer, much as Lydia's earlier suitor had. He stopped and stood over her, raised his palms on either side, said, "Here's Johnny."

Lydia turned her head and spit on the floor. "I heard your friends call you Jack."

"If I had friends," he said without missing a beat, "and if I did, you wouldn't be one of them, whoever the fuck you are."

"Oh, you're breakin' my heart." She crossed her arms and leaned back in her chair.

He turned to make some smart-ass quip to the bartender, and in that instant of distraction, Lydia moved. More quickly than her target could react, she reached for the Desert Eagle that was tucked under her belt in the small of her back. Right as Jack looked back at her and his eyes grew wide, she fired. Three shots. They slammed into his chest, blew him backwards through the air into the bar.

The bar patrons dove for cover, all except Frankie and Baldur who were up, 9mms in hand, and blocking the door. Frankie plugged the bartender who was going for a gun. The fat man crashed into the counter behind the bar and sent bottles of liquor cascading to the floor. One bullet passed through him and shattered the mirror behind the counter.

Lydia looked at the Desert Eagle in her hand. She blew on the tip of the barrel. "Damn.

Theo was right about this thing."

That was when Jack hit her. Despite the three gaping holes in his chest, his arms had transformed into long, muscled tentacles. One whipped across Lydia's face, knocking her off her seat, backwards into the wall. She was on her feet in mere seconds, but Frankie and Baldur were down beneath the blows of the second tentacle, and Jack was breaking for the back door. Lydia was off balance and her head was still ringing, but she squeezed off two quick shots. Her fire tore apart the door frame over Jack's head. His arms contracted to normal length as he ran. They looked like strings of sausages being sucked down a garbage disposal. He rushed headlong out the back door — and square into the arc of the fire axe.

Theo took the Tzimisce's head off with one clean blow — if a decapitation spewing blood and black ichor could be called clean. Jack's body ran a few more steps before tumbling to the ground. It was just momentum, but it looked like it took him a few seconds to figure out that his head was fucking gone.

By the time Lydia, Baldur, and Frankie reached the back door, Jack's blood was dry and crystallized. Slowly, before their eyes, his body too began to harden, dry, and crumble.

"That's what we've got to look forward to," Frankie said solemnly. "Some night."

Theo wiped the handle of the axe and tossed it aside in the alley. The four Brujah ignored the few terrorized customers who scrambled frantically out the front door now that the way was clear.

Theo turned to Lydia. "Don't give up on a fight before it's over," he said. She nodded Cher could kick Madonna's ass. somewhat bashfully. "Let's get out of here," he added, and turned to do just that, but then stopped and turned back to Lydia again. "Arm wrestling?" She smiled sheepishly.

"Showboating'll get you killed, kid."

Nobody argued, and they all left.

Tuesday, 2 November 1999, 1:59 AM Hemperhill Road Baltimore, Maryland The Lexus screeched to a halt at the curb. Almost before the car had stopped moving, Theo was out the front passenger's door and moving briskly toward the townhouse. He touched two of the eight steps and pounded uncharacteristically loudly on the front door.

Waiting only a few seconds, he pounded again.

When a startled ghoul opened the door, Theo simply said, "Get Vitel now. Hurry." Then he stepped inside.

The ghoul rushed to obey; this was the closest he'd ever seen the Brujah archon to a state of agitation. While Theo waited, he unclipped his SPAS 12 from inside his jacket and checked the ammo, then unfolded and secured the stock. Within a few moments of the ghoul's hasty exit, Vitel was coming down the stairs. He paused at sight of the shotgun in Theo's hands, the Ventrue's eyes narrowing suspiciously.

"We gotta go," Theo said at once. "They've broken through."

"They hit us heavy from the west, 1-70 and National Pike. We got 'em bottled up 'round Leakin Park, but I don't know how long." Vitel hesitated, so Theo pressed his point, speaking rapidly. "They'll be hittin' from the south too. Or if they get past Leakin and down Mulberry, we'll be cut off from the airport. Pieterzoon's got a plane waiting, or if you've arranged one I can get you there, but we gotta go now."

Vitel hesitated a moment longer, then turned to his ghoul, who was rushing back down the steps. "Frederick, get the briefcase from the safe. Now." Vitel turned to Theo. "You have a car waiting."

"Yeah. We'll change it on the way, just in case a pack has snuck in town and this one's marked."

Vitel followed Theo out the door and down the steps to the Lexus. Theo, out of habit, tucked his shotgun mostly under his jacket. He opened the back door for Vitel, then got in the front. He turned to Lydia, behind the wheel. "One more on the way." Theo scanned up and down the street. "All clear out here?"

"Yeah," said Lydia. The Desert Eagle was lying in her lap. Both her hands were on the wheel.

What seemed like forever passed before Frederick came out with the leather briefcase. He stopped only long enough to lock the door, then ran around the car and got in behind Lydia. He handed the briefcase to Vitel. Lydia pulled away from the curb with a jerk.

Within just a few minutes, three different police cars had rushed past heading westward, lights flashing, sirens blaring. Also to the west, Theo could see thick smoke rising from the horizon. The black billows were readily visible against the ambient pink of the night-time city sky.

"You have a plane standin' by?" Theo asked Vitel, who the Brujah noticed was also watching the distant smoke with some consternation.

"No," Vitel said. "Mr. Pieterzoon's graciousness is appreciated. I wasn't expecting anything like this. Nothing so soon."

"Me neither," Theo said. "They screened their movements pretty damn well. Everything "The Sabbat?"

"Very well." came at once, whole fuckin' convoy. They get in, we'll never root 'em all out."

"You want me to call and have another car or two go by for your other ghouls?" Theo asked.

Suddenly all the passengers lurched to the right as Lydia took a left turn hard enough to squeal the tires and leave skid marks through the intersection.

"Damn, girl!" Theo braced himself against the door. "The cops are all headed the other way. You tryin' to convince 'em to come back after us?"

Lydia sped on down the street. Her next turn, not noticeably more gentle than the preceding one, was through the open bay door of an old brick warehouse. The wide metal door rolled down quickly behind the car, blocking out the external light, and as Lydia screeched to a halt, the large, empty, cement-floored space of the warehouse fell into darkness.

With those words barely spoken, Theo turned and fired a shotgun burst into Vitel's face, dragonsbreath rounds. The white phosphorous charges tore through the head and torso of the former prince of Washington, burning through the seat and the rear windshield.

At the same instant that Theo fired, Lydia whirled with the Desert Eagle and blasted a.44 magnum slug between Frederick's eyes. The top half of his head exploded. He bounced off the back seat and slumped forward against Lydia's headrest.

Theo sprang from the smoke-filled car just as the warehouse lights flashed on. He threw open Vitel's door and leveled the SPAS at the Ventrue's body. What remained of the head leaned back, slack-j awed, against the smoldering seat. Large portions of Vitel's tailored suit, not to mention his flesh and the melted globule of gold that had been a pin shaped like an imperial eagle, steamed and sputtered.

Frankie and Baldur rushed forward from their assigned positions at the breaker box and the door. Christoph approached more cautiously.

"Holy shit!" Frankie marveled. "You blew his head clean off!"

"Nah, it's still attached, just fucked up," Baldur pointed out.

Lydia was out of the car now also. She wiped splattered blood from her face and licked her hands. The four Brujah all turned as one as the bay door clanked suddenly upward and open. In marched Jan Pieterzoon with Anton Baas and a dozen other heavily armed ghouls.

"Shut the fuckin' door!" Theo yelled at them. Several ghouls rushed to comply.

Theo turned back to Lydia, who was suddenly looking very perplexed. He followed her gaze, past the blood-soaked corpse of Frederick-to the empty, smoldering seat where, a moment before, Vitel's body had been.

"Shit." Theo took a step back from the car. "He's gone. Heads up, everybody."

That was when Frankie went down. One second he was standing there next to them, the next he let out a startled yell and was yanked under the Lexus.

"Yes, the Sabbat is like that," Vitel agreed.

"There is no need."

"Sorry."

"Where is the other car?" Vitel asked.

"Uh... Theo ...?"

"Shit! Under the car!"

Everyone was yelling at once. Theo scrounged a few more dragonsbreath rounds from his pocket and slammed them into the magazine. He started to squeeze off a burst under the car, but stopped. Frankie was down there.

"Shit!" Theo said again. He should've known better. A Ventrue can take a pretty good shot and survive to heal himself if he's got enough blood. But Vitel had to be way fucking old to hold together after what Theo had given him. And how the hell did he get past them out of the car? Frankie was going to have to take his chances, Theo decided. They couldn't afford to let Vitel drain him.

"Watch out!" Theo squatted and fired a burst under the car.

Yells from all around, and then Vitel shot out from beneath the Lexus. He was a blur, knocking Lydia and Baldur aside. Then the prince was gone again. The warehouse was suddenly quiet, except for Baldur scrambling to pull Frankie from beneath the car and cursing as he burned himself on the steaming phosphorous.

"Baas, your men by that door and that one," Theo shouted. "Nobody gets out. Lydia, Jan, you others, by the big door. Keep it closed!"

"He broke his neck," Baldur was saying in disbelief. "He broke Frankie's neck like a ... like a..."

Theo shut out the sounds of Kindred and ghouls rushing to obey his orders. He scanned the interior of the warehouse. Vitel was there somewhere, and he was proving as tricky as any Nosferatu... There. -The slightest bit of movement, away from the ghouls and the other Kindred. Can't give him time to heal, Theo thought. He fired another burst, emptying the magazine toward where he'd seen the motion. He saw Vitel, heard him cry out from the blast, but then everything went dark.

Blackness. Living shadow. A cloud of it enveloped Theo, blocked out his vision, muffled sound. He heard gunfire, but it sounded far away. The inky blackness coated Theo like a second skin. Chills shot through his body, his muscles starting to spasm. The sensation was repulsive, unnatural, evil. Theo had seen this before, had fought his way free before — but what the hell was a Ventrue prince doing firing off this kind of shit?

Theo was disoriented by the shadow, but he dove hard to the side — what he hoped was away from the car. He felt the drag of the darkness clinging to him like a greedy lover, but the force of his lunge tore him free. He landed on the cement, rolled, and jumped to his feet. The gunfire was much closer now. Pieterzoon's ghouls had opened on Vitel with their submachine guns. The cloud of darkness that had assaulted Theo was rapidly dissipating as Vitel took more and more hits from the ghouls.

Vitel was ragged. Much of his face was burned away, and his chest and clothes were in tatters. But the cursed blood that animated him was potent enough to hold him together, to pull him back from the brink of the abyss. And he was proving far from helpless, even after expending what must have been much blood.

As Theo's head cleared, Vitel, with a simple gesture, sent tendrils of darkness hurtling toward the impertinent ghouls who were dogging him. The ghouls, in self-defense, shifted their fire. The bullets shredded one of the snaking black tentacles, but several others found their marks, knocking ghouls aside, crushing some against the solid brick walls.

So much for a quiet hit, Theo thought. The warehouse was full of smoke and gunfire, "Frankie!"

What the...? snake-like tentacles crushing the life out of ghouls, and if any of the phosphorous had splattered too close to the Lexus's gas tank, the car might go up in a fireball any second.

And Theo still couldn't quite believe that a face full of dragonsbreath hadn't toasted Vitel.

That should have done in most any Kindred. The Brujah had never fought a creature quite this old before. And this ain't no Ventrue neither. Not throwing around shadow magic like that.

In the short space of time it took one of the tentacles to pound a ghoul into pulp, Theo reloaded the shotgun and fired another burst. Vitel staggered back, and a couple of the shadowy tentacles frayed and faded out of existence. The dragonsbreath might not be finishing him off, but it was taking a toll.

Theo charged in behind the blast. He fired again, but Vitel jumped out of the way. No — not jumping, hovering. Vitel was just floating in the air, hanging there as if he were suspended by a cable. But just as this was sinking in for Theo, Vitel was coming down, claws flashing, right at him. That moment of unexpected floating was enough to throw Theo's timing off. He tried to dodge, but Vitel's claws raked across his face and chest. Vitel closed again. Theo clubbed at him ineffectually with the emptied shotgun, but it was a sword slicing through the air, just over Theo's head, that drove Vitel back. Given a second's reprieve, Theo glanced back to see Christoph, broadsword in hand, wading into the fray.

Vitel's hands were no longer claws. What confronted the two Brujah was worse. Balanced on Vitel's right palm was a ball of flame, fire conjured from thin air-or perhaps from hell itself. Theo and Christoph each dove as Vitel hurled the fire. It passed right over them, shot across the warehouse, and landed amidst the second group of ghouls. The fireball erupted into a true inferno. Theo rolled to his feet to the sound of shrieking, burning ghouls. The smoke in the warehouse was growing thicker every second, threatening to block out the dim light from the ceiling units.

As Theo rummaged through his pockets for more dragonsbreath shells, others were pressing the attack. Lydia and Baldur were advancing on Vitel, with Pieterzoon and Baas each flanked out to opposite sides, all four assailants' guns blazing. The bullets were striking Vitel, driving him back half a step every few seconds, but the entry holes were closing over as quickly as they appeared — and Vitel merely smiled.

Theo slipped his last handful of dragonsbreath rounds into the SPAS and looked up to see another ball of flame in Vitel's hand. The archon was instantly ready to dive clear, but Vitel launched the fiery sphere in another direction. Lydia flung herself to the side, but Baldur wasn't so quick. The flame struck him and burst into a great conflagration. He whipped around and flailed madly, but the fire raged, burning away clothes, hair, undead flesh.

Lydia launched herself again, this time at her friend, knocking him to the ground. But the fire was more than she could take. As soon as she landed, she jumped away from Baldur as if she herself were now burning. She screamed, a panicked, terror-filled sound, as if he had been thrown at her instead of the other way around. She slapped at her legs, her chest, her face, trying to put out flames that were not there.

That was all Theo saw of her. He was charging Vitel for a better shot. But Jan and Baas were moving in also, blasting away with their MP5s, and Christoph was edging closer with his sword. Theo didn't have a clear shot and held his fire as he moved forward.

Vitel, practically ignoring the hail of submachine-gun fire from the two Dutchmen, watched the several Kindred and ghoul approaching. The former prince had remained incredibly calm throughout the fight, despite the seemingly long odds he'd faced. Now that But then Christoph hesitated, and Theo saw why. most of the ghouls and several Kindred were dispatched, he took on an almost demonically gleeful aspect. His eyes shone with delight in the destruction, in the bodies broken and burning. Far from thinking of escape, Vitel was preparing to finish the job. He was reveling in the slaughter.

And as Theo and the others moved closer, Vitel changed. Not merely his attitude, or his bearing. His form itself changed, grew taller, darker — as if the smoke and shadows now filling the warehouse were drawn to him, drawn into him. The warehouse was growing darker but, Theo realized, the darkness was spreading from Vitel, not the other way around. He was growing shadowy, pools of darkness seeping out from his many wounds, as if his body could no longer contain his black soul. Some of the bullets passed through him now; others seemed to disappear into the darkness without effect. At some point, his arms became, no longer arms, but spiraling black tentacles, four rather than two, obsidian cobras poised to strike. All this was shifting among the smoke and deepening shadows.

Nothing remained clear except his eyes, glowing red and fierce.

Suddenly, as one, the tentacles shot out, the cobras striking. A whip of solid darkness struck Theo across the face, ripped open further the ragged claw wound. Baas went down, his knee shattered. A tentacle whipped around Christoph's sword arm and jerked him off his feet, shaking him like a rag doll until his screams and the sound of snapping bones filled the air. His broadsword clattered to the cement below. Pieterzoon was caught by a giant black constrictor, arms pinned to his side. His MP5 fired harmlessly into the floor until the ammunition was spent and the weapon fell silent.

Theo climbed to his feet, blood seeping from the rent in his face, the gash in his chest. As he gazed upon the beast of shadow before him, the archon's studied battle calm suddenly drained away. He saw standing ahead, thrashing his compatriots, not Marcus Vitel, Ventrue pretender of obviously Lasombra blood, but a creature purely of the Beast. The fiery red eyes, the pure darkness spilling over through a man-shaped portal from hell. This was the Sabbat. This was a demon that would subjugate them all.

And the Beast within Theo answered. The fire that was hatred and anger, violence and hunger, rose up within him, took hold of his limbs and gave them strength. Theo fought the Beast before him with the Beast within his own breast, the demon that would one night consume each and every one of them.

His allies down or immobilized, Theo charged. The first blast from his shotgun ripped apart the appendage that had struck him. The second blast, the last of his dragonsbreath, he poured into the heart of the creature that Vitel had become. The shadow demon staggered. Theo threw himself at it. He swung his gun again like a club. Vitel stumbled back farther. They were at the brick wall now, the rear of the warehouse that was transformed into one of the nine fireand smoke-filled levels of hell.

Then the remaining tentacles converged on Theo. They sprang back from their far-flung targets to strike him, hitting him from behind on the head, back, legs. His knees buckled, but he didn't fall. A black cord lashed him across the face. Another tentacle whipped at him — Theo caught it, stopped it in midair. He held it in both hands and, fueled by his blood and the fire of his belly, ripped it apart. The shadow demon Vitel roared in anguish.

The tentacle that Theo had severed with his bare hands dissolved into nothingness.

Before Vitel's cry had completely left his gaping black maw, Theo scooped Christoph's broadsword from the floor. The archon swung, seeking blood but settling for viscous shadow. He cut away another tentacle, and then the last. Vitel, eyes burning with bright hatred, cursed in pain and fury. Darkness flooded out of his body and swept over Theo in a tidal wave of oblivion, but the Brujah would not be denied. He swung again. The sword clove through the shadow, through the trunk of the Vitel beast, the tip of the weapon scraping the brick wall behind and showering a spray of sparks into the darkness. Whether the terrible sound was the force of steel against brick and mortar or the bellow of Vitel, Theo couldn't tell. But as he raised the blade to strike again, the shadow began to break up. The darkness contracted, seemed to wither and crack, and a moment later, where the demon Vitel had stood, fine black powder floated to the ground, oily dust upon the cement.

Jan attempted a smile, but the pained result was not particularly effective. "Yes ... quite."

The smoke still hung heavy in the warehouse. Opening the doors would only have attracted attention to the building — something they didn't want — and there was no one inside in danger of succumbing to smoke inhalation. Jan's few remaining ghouls were keeping watch outside. The warehouse walls were solid, but there had been a lot of gunfire, and nobody wanted the cops stumbling in.

"Don't you guys have a secret handshake or something?" Theo asked. "Us, we don't have to worry about that kinda thing. Nobody ever pretends to be a Brujah, especially a prince.

Hell, there's probably ten or twenty Brujah princes pretendin' to be something else."

Jan fidgeted a bit and tried to concentrate on the lock on Vitel's briefcase. It had been a long time, Theo decided, since he'd enjoyed someone else's discomfort this much, and it didn't hurt that the enjoyment was at a Ventrue's expense.

"How 'bout Lucinde?" Theo asked, leaning very close so no one else would overhear. "She know about this? About him?" He knew the answer to that, but he couldn't resist asking.

God, I'd love to be there when Jan tells her about this, Theo thought. He waited for some response, but Jan was pointedly not paying attention. He was thumbing combinations on the briefcase's lock and listening for any sign of progress.

"The cop decoy worked fine," Theo said. "The cop cars, the fire on the west side."

"Hm?" Jan looked up for a moment. "Oh, good." He returned his attention to the lock.

"You think it's trapped?" Theo asked, tapping the briefcase.

"Okay." Theo took the briefcase from Jan, propped it against his own chest, and pressed with his fingers into the crease by the handle. They dug through the leather and into the metal beneath. Theo kept pressing, working his fingertips into the widening gap, and the briefcase popped open. "There you go." He handed it back to Jan and left the Ventrue to sort through the contents.

Nearby, Lydia and Christoph sat dejectedly by Frankie, who was propped up against the side of the Lexus. The angle of his neck looked distinctly uncomfortable.

"Guess he fucked me up pretty good," said Frankie, seeing Theo.

"But we fucked him too, didn't we? I'll be fine. Just give me a little time, a little blood."

"Yeah. Sure thing," said Theo, but he wasn't convinced. Sure, blood could heal broken bones, but they didn't always heal straight, and spinal injuries could be a real bitch. Hard to figure what might happen with a broken neck. So he turned to Lydia and Christoph, who were considerably less upbeat than Frankie. Then again, Christoph was never upbeat.

What was it Lydia had said about him once? Moody as a damn girl. Christoph was "Damnedest Ventrue I ever met," Theo said laconically.

"I doubt it."

"Guess so," Theo said.

"Hope I didn't hurt it," Theo said. "I didn't exactly mean to slice through a brick wall."

"It's a strong blade," Christoph said. "I'm glad it finished the job, even if I wasn't wielding it."

Theo nodded. Christoph said stuff like that sometimes when he did decide to talk, but he was good enough in a fight.

"Man, I'm sorry," Lydia said from where she sat next to Christoph.

"Don't need to be," Theo said. He started to walk away — he didn't feel much like a confessional just now; his face and his chest hurt — but Lydia wasn't done yet.

"It's my fault," she said. She gestured toward the pile of ash that had been Baldur, but she didn't look at it. "I should've helped him. And Frankie too."

"Didn't nobody ask you nothin'," she snapped at him. "He was on fire. I coulda put it out, coulda..." Her voice faltered as she remembered the uncontrollable terror that had overcome her. Her eyes welled up with blood as she relived those moments.

"Hey," Theo said, "one of your people went down for good. It happens. It'll happen again."

She shot him a challenging, bloody glare. "Get fuckin' used to it." Then he did walk away. sharpening his sword.

"Wasn't nothing you could do," Frankie assured her.